Baylor Alum to Deliver Annual Homecoming Sociology Lecture

Oct. 27, 2005

Dr. Joe Feagin, The Ella C. McFadden Professor of Liberal Arts at Texas A&M University and a Baylor University alumnus, will present the third annual Sociology Alumni Homecoming Lecture at 2 p.m. Friday, Oct. 28, in room 116 at the Draper Academic Building on campus. The lecture is free and open to the public.

Feagin's lecture, "Backstage Racism: What Whites Do in Private and Public," will examine some of the 15,000 accounts kept in journals by 626 white students at 28 colleges and universities. The students documented everyday conversations and events that involve racial issues, most of which document racist thought, commentary and actions by white friends, relatives and strangers.

After graduating from Baylor in 1960, Feagin earned his doctorate from Harvard. Prior to his appointment at Texas A&M, he held faculty positions at the University of California at Riverside, the University of Texas and the University of Florida. He is the author of 46 books and 170 journal articles and book chapters. In 1999, he was elected president of the American Sociological Association.

Each year, the alumni lecture series features one of the more than 100 Baylor graduates who have earned doctorates in sociology.